HEADS
FACES &
SPIRITUAL
ENCOUNTERS

A collage of four abstract portrait segments, each featuring distinct artistic styles and colors. The top left has a sketch-like drawing of an eye, the top right shows a textured, colorful painting of an eye, the bottom left has a bold, graphic depiction of lips, and the bottom right features a monochrome, detailed drawing of lips and chin.

On Exhibit thru June 18, 2023

THE EDWARD & DIANE KNIPPERS COLLECTION

  • Man with Violin, 17th Century Dutch

  • George Wingate Looks at the Brutal World, Catherine Prescott

  • David and Bathsheba, Marc Chagall

  • True Image, Station Six, Katherine Brimberry

  • The Face of Christ (Chi-Rho), Edward Knippers

  • The Lady in the Feathered Hat, Rodney Charles Hardee

About the Exhibit

In the history of the human race has there ever been an individual who has not drawn some simulate of a head or a face? From the Neolithic Plastered Skull found in Jericho, Jordan to a child’s earliest markings in the 21st Century it is the face that captures the attention as we try to make sense of our world. HEADS, FACES, AND SPIRITUAL ENCOUNTER draws on this fascination of the human heart and mind.

From noted artists such as Henri Matisse, Marc Chagall, Otto Dix, David Alfaro Siqueiros, Paul Wunderlich, Bernard Buffet, Georges Rouault, Eric Gill, Giovanni Castiglione, Karl Schmidt-Rottluff, Werner Drewes, and Leonard Baskin to self-taught artists such as Elder Anderson Johnson and Rodney Charles Hardee to anonymous African artists from Ife, Nigeria and the Dan Peoples with many known and lesser-known artists of high quality in between, this exhibition offers a thoughtful and enjoyable glance at the mystery of the human face.

It is hoped that in these forty-some-odd works, differing in conceptions, styles, and media, the viewer will find not only something that will arrest their attention aesthetically but also will intrigue them emotionally and intellectually. Furthermore, we dare hold the aspiration that after seeing HEADS, FACES, AND SPIRITUAL ENCOUNTER that the viewer will never again take the faces of family, friends, and those around them for granted.

“...we dare hold the aspiration that after seeing HEADS, FACES, AND SPIRITUAL ENCOUNTER that the viewer will never again take the faces of family, friends, and those around them for granted.”

  • Visage, Henri Matisse

  • Israel in Egypt’s Land, Ralph Scharf

  • Portrait of Michelangelo, Thomas Browne Cornell

  • Cristo, David Alfaro Siqueiros

  • Veil of Veronica, Otto Dix (1891-1969)

  • Adieau Jesus a Marie, Michel Ciry

  • Vallauris Poster, Pablo Picasso

About the Collectors:
Ed and Diane Knippers

A CIVA Interview

CIVA: How did the Edward and Diane Knippers’ Collection begin? 

Edward Kippers: Early in our marriage Diane and I were excited to collect whatever our meager resources could afford. Folk and naïve art, often from the makers themselves, proved to be within our reach. Howard Finster,  Clementine Hunter, Chief Wiley, Edgar Tolson, and others were a delight to meet and a joy to collect. Trading my art for that of other artists also allowed us to have the works of friends whose art we admired. 

CIVA: Did you find yourself focusing on any particular style or period of art? 

EK: With God’s grace, collecting opportunities continued to come our way and a body of work began to form around our Faith, included historic and twentieth-century pieces esthetically related to my work in the studio. The German Expressionist and Georges Rouault were favorites and there were many others.  

CIVA: Any artists that you were particularly attracted to? 

EK: Diane said that, when possible, I could always buy Oskar Kokoschka. She also liked Rodo Boulanger and Marino Marini. In addition, we tried to collect the work of my teachers: Zao Wou-ki, Otto Eglau, S. W. Hayter,  Walter Stevens, and others of the Knoxville Seven. It is in this way, The Edward and Diane Knippers’ Collection of Fine Art came to be.  

CIVA: What is your philosophy regarding collecting art? 

EK: There is a myriad of other more extensive and much more important collections than ours but that in no way diminishes the joy that we have had in creating this collection which has been a special gift from our Lord. Over the years it has become clear that one should not collect art in order to amass possessions. Collecting art is an act beyond ownership. It is an act of preservation because you want to protect an object of art from the forces that might destroy it because you believe that humanity will be better off having the object, than not. It is an act of faith because you believe that in the future there will be those, like you, who will be enriched by the object’s presence and will also find it worth protecting.  

CIVA: Art collecting has sometimes been viewed as a privilege reserved for the wealthy and powerful to exhibit one’s status. But that is far from who you are and your intent. How do you understand the act of collecting? 

EK: Collecting art is an exercise of love. First, the love of our human nature and its expression in objects that reflect the poetry of our world. Then there is also a love of history as we collect the artifacts produced in different times and in different places that encapsulate the thoughts and ideas of our ancestors that we can then contemplate in our day-to-day lives. In this way, an art collection in our home adds a depth of flavor, a richness, to our environment and therefore a richness to our time here on earth. 

CIVA: How has your Christian faith influenced your collecting? 

EK: For the Christian who collects art there is an added imperative. It is that in art we can at times intuit a reflection of God as we look upon the results of the creativity of the artist. After all, it is He who has made us creators in His Image, and therefore the imagination of the human mind and heart in the service of good must bring Him joy. 

View works by Ed Knippers on his website; follow him on Facebook.

“...the joy that we have had in creating this collection ... has been a special gift from our Lord. ”